Amazon, Direct2Drive, GameStop, and Steam (and presumably other e-tailers and retailers) are now offering pre-purchases of a Battlefield: Bad Company 2 Limited Edition, which offers the six perks in the military shooter sequel announced last October. These are an Up-armor package mounted on all vehicle types, additional weapon packages for the driver of all armored vehicles, a Vehicle Motion Sensor, a Tracer Dart Pistol, an M1A1 Sub-machine Gun, and the M1911 Pistol. A FAQ released following the announcement of the LE explained that these perks are early access to multiplayer upgrades, which must be unlocked by owners of the vanilla edition. The two editions are the same price, so this is meant as a pre-purchase incentive. There is also an "online disclaimer" on the Steam page for the LE with two notes we haven't seen before, saying online play will require an account with ea.com, and that online access to the game is "non transferrable." Here's word, apologies for the shouting:

ACCEPTANCE OF END USER LICENSE AGREEMENT REQUIRED TO PLAY. ACCESS TO ONLINE FEATURES AND/OR SERVICES REQUIRES AN EA ACCOUNT AND REGISTRATION WITH THE ENCLOSED SERIAL CODE. REGISTRATION FOR ONLINE FEATURES IS LIMITED TO ONE EA ACCOUNT PER SERIAL CODE AND IS NON-TRANSFERABLE. EA ONLINE TERMS & CONDITIONS CAN BE FOUND AT www.ea.com. YOU MUST BE 13+ TO REGISTER FOR AN EA ACCOUNT. EA MAY RETIRE ONLINE FEATURES AFTER 30 DAYS NOTICE POSTED ON www.ea.com.

This is what royally pisses me off. They made a big deal about how they were going to do it so much better than IW with MW2, then they announce that only they will be running dedicated servers. The whole non-transferable thing doesn't bother me, but that just irks the shit out of me.

Yeah it's basically all the exact same problems as MW2 but with a better ping and more stability.

Still no mods, still no admins, still no custom maps, still no communities.

xXBatmanXx wrote on Jan 25, 2010, 10:16:I worry about server shutdowns as well....but I assume the servers will be under our control for the PC, like Battlefield, etc....maybe their STATS will die one day, but the game itself will not.

Hell you can still play really bad over cheated servers of BF2. Not sure why you would want to - but you can.

You assume wrong. The only reason you can still play BF1942 and BF2 online is because the master server for those games is controlled by Gamespy. Games controlled by EA's own network get shutdown regularly. An example of an EA FPS game which got shutdown is Medal of Honor Pacific (which was not a Gamespy game like the other Medal of Honor games). NFSHP2 is also still playable online because it uses Gamespy whereas newer Need for Speed titles have already been shutdown by EA because they did not.

With BFBC2 you can bet that EA will pull the plug at some point because it can, especially since the dedicated server software won't be publicly released.

Honestly, they had a ton of goodwill from the community after the MW2 debacle and now they're totally fucking it up before the game is even out. They're losing their chance of taking on MW2 with every shitty announcement.

This is what royally pisses me off. They made a big deal about how they were going to do it so much better than IW with MW2, then they announce that only they will be running dedicated servers. The whole non-transferable thing doesn't bother me, but that just irks the shit out of me.

“The greatness of a nation and its moral progress can be judged by the way its animals are treated.” - Mahatma Gandhi

I worry about server shutdowns as well....but I assume the servers will be under our control for the PC, like Battlefield, etc....maybe their STATS will die one day, but the game itself will not.

Unfortunately they've said dedicated servers will be run by "EA preferred partners" only. Honestly, they had a ton of goodwill from the community after the MW2 debacle and now they're totally fucking it up before the game is even out. They're losing their chance of taking on MW2 with every shitty announcement.

I can live with this fact very good. I would not buy a pre-owned game with a serial protection either... you never can tell if the previous owner wrote it down somewhere so I'll be always on the safe side if I buy it new.

And yet you posted a response anyway, acknowledging my post and again ignoring any points I raised. I win.

Sorry, but you're the idiot here. If you *purchase* (buy) a product, historically you have had the right to transfer that product to anyone else.

How am I the idiot? I criticised the other poster for erroneously posting that you're paying to rent a game. You still "own" the game, it's just you're paying for a non-transferable license. Historical evidence is of little concern in a fast evolving word where the physical product takes second place to the intellectual property.

As for how many people sell their games or trade them in? Obviously you haven't been paying much attention to the success of GameStop, etc. or how Wal-Mart and even Best Buy now offer trade-in services. There's also a slew of secondhand stores that sell used PC games such as the Half-Price book store (in my area).

Of course I've been paying attention and it's a practice I very much dislike, as it is taking money away from the developers.

BF1943 on the xbox already requires a EA online account. nothing new here, didnt mind doing it with that, and wont mind doing it with this.

(digtal download on xbox and anyhow thats linked to your live account), if you wanna bitch at EA bitch at the list of game servers they shut down this month, ones from games titled 2008 is a bit rough.

/Theo

This comment was edited on Jan 25, 2010, 03:08.

Everyone on Bluesnews is synical, get over it. edit: i cant spell, this is my disclaimer.

ACCEPTANCE OF END USER LICENSE AGREEMENT REQUIRED TO PLAY. ACCESS TO ONLINE FEATURES AND/OR SERVICES REQUIRES AN EA ACCOUNT AND REGISTRATION WITH THE ENCLOSED SERIAL CODE. REGISTRATION FOR ONLINE FEATURES IS LIMITED TO ONE EA ACCOUNT PER SERIAL CODE AND IS NON-TRANSFERABLE. EA ONLINE TERMS & CONDITIONS CAN BE FOUND AT www.ea.com. YOU MUST BE 13+ TO REGISTER FOR AN EA ACCOUNT. EA MAY RETIRE ONLINE FEATURES AFTER 30 DAYS NOTICE POSTED ON www.ea.com.